Day 38: September 27, 2014

Today we had a field trip for environmental science. We left the dormitory at 8:15 and headed to the Can Gio Island, otherwise known as Monkey Island. It was quite a bus trip and included a ferry ride across the Saigon River. Our first stop was a landfill, owned by Vietnam Waste Solutions, which is the first private landfill in the country. They receive half of the city's garbage (or 3000 tons) each day. The operator is from the States and has toured landfills on all of the continents except Africa.

Tours at the landfill are not a normal thing, and we are the first Loyola group to go. Pictures were not allowed. We sat in a board room with the operator while he explained things to us before we got on a bus to tour the grounds. We only saw three facilities, which was the water treatment, the composting, and the place where they burn off the methane. At the water treatment center, they took out a sample of leachate to show us what the water looks like before it gets treated and then showed us another sample after it has been treated. As for the compost, they have machines that sort the garbage from the food waste. The compost used cannot be used for growing food, however, because of all the plastic that remains it. The operator discussed how Vietnam's use of plastic bags is a huge problem and how much of the garbage received is plastic. People don't throw out valuable things and keep most things that can be reused.

The whole time we were touring the grounds, we had a video camera and photographer following us. After we got back on the bus, Vien told us that some people have been complaining that water since the landfill moved in has decreased in quality, although the company says they are doing everything correctly. Our professor may think that they are going to use footage of us being there as publicity since no journalists are allowed on the sites. Alex even got interviewed by them about her experience there!

After our tour, we got back on the bus and headed for lunch at a little restaurant on the side of the road, where I had fried shrimp with rice. We also all got to try clams and blue crab. When lunch was finished, it was back on the bus to head to Monkey Island!

We had been warned about the monkeys and told that they would try to steal our stuff, but I was still unprepared for how they acted. They would come right up to you and if you had food in your hand they would snatch it. While Christina was taking pictures of one, one came up to her and took her glasses right off her face, running into the forest with them. The park ranger had to chase it down but luckily she got them back. We saw people feeding the monkeys wrapped food and monkeys eating popsicles. When a monkey stole someone's baseball cap, I saw the park ranger shoot at it with a slingshot so it would drop it from the trees.

We got to see some other wildlife, such as fiddler crabs and mudskippers, which is kind of like a fish that uses its fins to walk across the water. The best part of the trip, though, was when we got on a speedboat and swerved through the narrow passage ways of the mangrove forest. We arrived at a camp where the Viet Kong had their hideout and got to walk through it. It was so surreal, being deep in the mangrove forest and knowing that during the Vietnam War there were Vietnamese who stayed there, planning attacks on American troops but also having to deal with things like crocodiles. All of the buildings were above water about 6 feet and wooden pathways led to the different buildings.

The trip was longer than expected, but we made it back to the dormitory around 6:30. Cate, Alex, Tori, and I went out to a Mexican restaurant for supper, where I ordered a chicken burrito. I also ate part of Tori's chicken and chorizo quesadilla and Cate's avocado salad. We ordered some churros with chocolate sauce. We came back to the dorm afterwards and spent the night doing nothing, what was well needed.